Thursday, April 25, 2013

"If there are no
bookstores, no libraries, no serious publishers with passionate, dedicated,
idealistic editors, what will happen to our literature? Who will discover and
mentor new writers? Who will publish our important books? What will happen if
there are no more books like these?"

Then there's a list of
38 books, including All the President's Men, Catcher in the Rye, The Color
Purple, Fahrenheit 451, Catch 22, etc. I agree that many of them are great.

Then he ends with:

"The Federal
Government has stepped in to save banks, and the automobile industry, but where
are they on the important subject of books? Or if the answer is state and local
government, where are they? Is any state doing anything? Why are there no
impassioned editorials in influential newspapers or magazines? Who will save
our books? Our libraries? Our bookstores?"

I respect Patterson for
his marketing genius. I also like many of his books. He makes 94
million dollars a year, so he's obviously doing quite a bit right.

But I'm not finding much
to agree with here.

"what will happen
to our literature?"

Perhaps writers will
write it? Aren't they the ones who wrote all of those books on that list?

One of those books
mentioned above was Different Seasons by Stephen King. Does anyone think King will quit writing because the publishing world keeps changing and evolving? Is
there anything that could get him to stop writing?

There are thousands of
authors self-publishing. I'm sure some of them are writing great, important
literature.

Except Amazon has no
barriers to entry, and gives writers a better royalty rate.

"Who will discover
and mentor new writers?"

When did writers become
invalids who are incapable of growing, learning, and improving without
hand-holding?

Are books such rare,
delicate hothouse flowers that the utmost care must be given to their nurturing
and feeding or they'll perish without it?

With ebooks, the readers
are the ones who discover new writers. And those readers actually have a chance
to discover more books than ever before, because many of them were never
mentored by the establishment.

Would Toole have been so
disheartened if he could have self-pubbed via KDP? We'll never know. But here
is a case where a great work of art in search of a mentor didn't get one, and
only through the determination of the dead writer's mother did it go on to
become recognized as one of the greatest works in literature.

Toole needed less
mentoring, fewer roadblocks, and more opportunities to get his book published.
Which self-publishing allows.

"Who will publish
our important books?"

I'm the first to admit
that I'm an entertainer. That's all I aspire to be. Whiskey Sour will never be
Catcher in the Rye, nor was it meant to be.

But I'm pretty sure
there are writers who have important books in them. And rather than go through
what Toole--and no doubt countless others--had to go through with the legacy
system, they now have the opportunity to publish those works themselves.

Perhaps, without the
legacy system, there will be no Maxwell
Perkins to guide those geniuses
of tomorrow. But there have always been, and always will be writing classes.
And critique groups. And freelance editors. And peers. A writer doesn't have to
work alone. And in exchange for getting this assistance, the writer doesn't
then have to pay a large percentage of royalties, forever.

PG says maybe some baby
authors want nurturing, but most grown-up authors don’t. If you simply must
have nurturing, maybe a dog or cat is a better idea than an agent or publisher.
They’ll love you to pieces and never ask for a contract (unless the cat hires
an attorney).

Like many things in
traditional publishing, maybe you get nurturing whether you want it or not.

Here’s an idea. Let’s
make nurturing an à la carte option that the author can pay for:

While there are
substantive differences between mentoring and nurturing, I must say that while
I was taught many things about legacy publishing by those in the business, I didn't
require any mentoring, nurturing, or hand-holding. I was lucky to find a good
agent, Jane Dystel, who believed in me and was willing to work hard on my
behalf, even when countless publishers rejected my books.Books that never were
traditionally published, but have gone on to earn me over a million dollars.

The publishing industry
did not teach me craft. I never required much editing. And though I never
considered my books "important" I sure tried in vain to get my
publishers behind them. Which never happened.

But I'll answer the
actual question. If the true concern is that great books (like the 38 on the
above list) will get lost in the ebook tsunami of crap (which I debunked, but I digress), then I have a
perfect solution:

James Patterson's Important Literature Series

All Patterson has to do
is hire a group of editors to sift through self-published books, looking for
great literature. Authors can also submit their work to this program. Then,
when worthy books are discovered, Patterson can make a big announcement,
re-publish it with a lot of press and fanfare and his name behind it, and these
important books won't get lost in the kerfuffle.

I don't see this costing
very much to do. Oprah did it with her book club. There are people other
than those in publishing who can discover great books and help get them noticed.

If Patterson won't fund
it, why not get a government grant for that instead of a bailout?

"The Federal
Government has stepped in to save banks, and the automobile industry, but where
are they on the important subject of books?"

While our nation does
have an unfortunate history of helping the careless, uber-rich upper class
continue to stay uber-rich by cleaning up after their greedy mistakes by using
the tax money of the middle class, how about instead the publishing industry
simply tries to compete? Maybe by embracing technology instead of repeatedly
trying to halt its progress? Maybe by lowering the prices of books so more
people had access to them? Maybe by treating authors fairly?

The Federal Government
doesn't need to intervene. Unless they can somehow force every executive in NY
Publishing to read my blog.

"Who will save our
books? Our libraries? Our bookstores?"

Last I checked, books
don't need saving. Ebooks are thriving.

Our libraries would be
thriving as well, if the publishers Patterson is pleading for actually played
fair with their digital rights. I have
a solution for that, too.

And bookstores? Well, as
my friend Ann Voss Peterson said, look how every musician stopped making music
once all the record stores went out of business.

Oh, wait. People are
still making music. Good music, in fact. And lots of it. Even without record
stores in every town.

I also need to point out that there are a lot of great books released by legacy publishers that fail to ever find their audience, and then go out of print. Publishers can discover important novels, and then fail to properly promote them. Which brings up an interesting point: All of those important books on the above list are big bestsellers.What about all the great books that don't hit the NYT list? Who speaks for those?

"E-books are fine
and dandy, but it’s all happening so quickly, and I don’t think anyone thought
through the consequences of having many fewer bookstores, of libraries being
shut down or limited, of publishers going out of business — possibly in the
future, many publishers going out of business."

Because without
libraries, bookstores, or publishers there will be no more books?

Of course there will be
books.

Will there be places to
get books?

Sure there will.

And the books will be
cheaper, and the authors will make a higher royalty.

I'd also argue that
books will be more accessible. Some people don't live near bookstores or
libraries. But a Kindle allows people anywhere to buy ebooks, and to also get
them for free.

If Patterson is worried
that the poor won't be able to afford Kindles, how about asking the government
to buy Kindles for all libraries to loan to patrons, and forcing publishers to
drop DRM and sell ebooks to libraries as I
described in my link above? Doesn't that seem like it will be more helpful, practical, and
less expensive than a bailout?

And if the government
doesn't do it, well, 94 million dollars would buy 1,300,000 Kindles. There are 121,000 libraries in the US, so each one would
get ten.

Patterson is doing a
great deal of good for the world, with www.readkiddoread.com, with his scholarships, with all of the books
he gives away.

But maybe the industry
he's working in doesn't serve the greater good. Maybe he should be backing a
different horse.

Is Patterson really
concerned about important books being lost? With his money and fame helping
important books get publicity, and with every library having access to Kindles
and inexpensive ebooks, shouldn't that alleviate his concerns?

"In Germany, Italy,
and France, they protect bookstores and publishers. It is widely practiced in
parts of Europe. I don’t think that’s outlandish."

But I don't want my tax
dollars going toward capitalist ventures that are no longer valid because
technology is changing while they continue to cling to outdated business
models.

Great books will be
written without the Big 5. People will be able to buy books without brick and
mortar bookstores. And any enterprise that exists to make money should do so
because it is good at what it does, not because the government is bailing it so
it can continue to make bad decisions and inevitably fold anyway.

"There might be tax
breaks, there might be limitations on the monopolies in the book business. We
haven’t gotten into laws that should or shouldn’t be done in terms of the
internet."

But I'm not for giving
tax breaks to a billion dollar industry that hurts authors and readers.

"The press doesn't
deal with the effects of e-books as a story. Borders closing down is treated as
a business story. Where we are in Westchester during the summer, you’d think
that’d be a bookstore haven, and there’s nothing. And that’s not unusual. I
don’t think we can be the country we’d like to be without literature."

If you own a Kindle, Mr.
Patterson, you don't need a bookstore in Westchester, and you don't have to
worry about being without literature.

If you can't afford a
Kindle, let's use our tax dollars for that. Get Kindles into all libraries, so
everyone has access to ebooks.

Borders closing is
a business story. They didn't close because people are reading less. They
closed because people are finding their books elsewhere.

"I was in Nashville
last night to go to a kickoff at Ann Patchett’s store. One of the things we
agreed on is there are too many people talking about things who don’t do
anything. She did something. She bought a bookstore. To some extent, it’s a
symbolic act. But it got a lot of coverage. And it has to be out of love."

Just because libraries
and bookstores are where people used to discover great books doesn't mean that
without them people will never discover great books.

Just because the
publishing industry published great books doesn't mean without them no more
great books will be published.

But it is possible to
love books without patronizing bookstores. And it is possible for books to
thrive without them being sold by bookstores.

That said, two years ago Blake Crouch and I came up with some ideas to help save bookstores. Not a single bookstore contacted us.

"I don’t think we
have a real strong spokesperson in the publishing community, someone who can
stand up. If they were, they got distracted by lawsuits [against Amazon and
publishing houses]. That scares publishers, as it should. It doesn't really
matter. I’m stepping up a little. But it’d be nice if it was the head of a publishing
company."

What would be nice is if
publishers actually cared about readers and writers, instead of their own continued
existence. But I don't blame them for worrying about their stockholders. That's
capitalism.

Which is exactly why, if
the system is failing, they SHOULD NOT be bailed out.

They ran the industry.
They were the gatekeepers. They made their fortunes, and also helped Patterson
make his. Now they aren't needed. And it is entirely their fault they aren't
needed. And asking the government to help them is like asking peasants to use
their money to buy Marie Antoinette cake.

If James Patterson wants
to step up, ads asking for the government to bail out the publishing industry
isn't the way to lead a crusade to save libraries and important books.